


Odd Frog Out

by kirani



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Derek "Nursey" Nurse is Unchill, Friends to Lovers, Insecurity, M/M, Multi, Polyamory, Polyamory Negotiations, Sharing a Bed, canon-typical alcohol use
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-03
Updated: 2019-03-03
Packaged: 2019-11-06 21:30:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,889
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17947442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kirani/pseuds/kirani
Summary: Samwell is basically everything Will wanted it to be.There’s one little problem. That would be that his amazing, wonderful, best friends are also… well, they’re really hot. And sweet and kind and charming. And a good dancer (Nursey) and amazingly flexible (Chowder) and they’re both just everything Will could want in a boyfriend.But he’s not about to choose between them. So he says nothing.Then Nursey and Chowder start dating.





	Odd Frog Out

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Denois](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Denois/gifts).



> Happy birthday, Den! You're a great friend, cheerleader, beta, and writer, so I thought you deserved some polyfrogs for your birthday. Hope you like it!  
> a huge thank you to bigspicysenpai for the beta and title! And to Sav for the help and the amazing graphic!

Samwell is basically everything Will wanted it to be. 

It’s a safe space for him to be out if he chooses but also okay if he’s not ready. 

He’s got two best friends, even if he and Nurse bicker more than most friends. He’s got a great team with a captain who’s going pro next year. 

He even comes out to Chowder at one point and he’s absolutely amazing, of course. He’s still figuring out how to come out to Nursey, but he’s tried to drop some hints and he thinks Nursey might have an inkling. 

Really, college could not be going better.

There’s one little problem. That would be that his amazing, wonderful, best friends are also… well, they’re really hot. And sweet and kind and charming. And a good dancer (Nursey) and amazingly flexible (Chowder) and they’re both just everything Will could want in a boyfriend. 

But he’s not about to choose between them. So he says nothing.

Then Nursey and Chowder start dating. 

It’s late in their frog fall semester when Will’s two best friends in the world walk into the library for their frog study session holding hands. 

And Will’s heart is suddenly in his shoes. 

He’s been so stupid. 

He’s spent all this time pining away after both of them and now he’s missed his chance with both of them. 

It makes sense, of course. They’re both gorgeous and charming and he has a lot to unlearn given how he grew up, but he feels suddenly incredibly left behind. 

He realizes suddenly that they’re watching him, nervously, waiting for a response. 

So Will pastes on a bright grin and decides chirping is the best route. 

“You two better not ditch out on frog nights to go make out or something,” he teases.

The tension breaks and both of them break into easy smiles. 

“Chill, Dexy, you’re still our number one bro,” Nurse assures him.

“Yeah! We’re inseparable! We’re the frogs! We’ll make out… other nights,” Chowder adds, a blush dusting his cheeks. 

“Frog hug?” Will asks. 

They grin and wrap their arms around Will, folding him in. He breathes out a small sigh as he’s wrapped up in his two favorite people. It’s gonna be alright. 

So long as Will can ignore his broken heart. 

~

Things get less clear when Caitlin Farmer comes along. 

Chowder is riding Will piggyback style in a race because “I love him but I am not entrusting my bodily safety to Derek Nurse,” when Will missteps and careens into half the women’s volleyball team. 

(He’d been too focused on forcing down the spike of jealousy that Chowder had so easily confessed to loving Derek Nurse.)

And then Chowder starts… to flirt. There’s no other way to look at it. A very pretty girl is the object of his over-the-top worry, even though he and Will had bowled over at least six of them, and he’s pulling out all the stops. 

Will looks over to Nursey, who smiles and throws an arm over Will’s shoulders. 

“Chill, we’re non-monogamous,” is all he says, then begins to talk Will’s ear off about some idiot in one of his classes. 

That night, back in his dorm room, he looks up non-monogamy until he gets overwhelmed and decides it’s a moot point anyway. If they’d wanted to date him, they would have asked.

~

Chowder takes Caitlin, his new volleyball playing girlfriend, to Winter Screw, and Nursey and Will set each other up with terrible dates, as per tradition.

By the end of the dance, their dates have fled and the two of them stagger drunkenly back to the freshman dorms together, arms around each other for balance (nothing more!) and giggling like little kids. 

“I’m glad our dates ditched us,” Will confesses. 

“I thought you were having fun with yours! She seemed nice!”

“She seemed completely wrong for me in literally every way.”

“Ouch,” Nursey drops his arm from Will’s waist.

“What? That’s the point of Screw, isn’t it? Screw your friends with terrible dates?”

“I thought she’d be good for you,” Nursey mumbles. 

Will gently takes his elbow and turns him to face him. 

“Nursey, I’m so, incredibly, hopelessly gay. You know that right?”

“Ha, ha,” Nursey forces out. “Very funny, Poindexter.”

Will  _ thinks  _ he’s joking but they’re both pretty drunk, so he brushes it off and changes the subject, thanking Nursey’s poor alcohol tolerance that he’s easily swayed.

By the morning, he’s completely forgotten about the conversation. 

~

Despite Will’s fears, the frogs continue to be best friends, even when two-thirds of them are dating each other and the other is hopelessly in love with both of them. 

(That’s what Will is, after all. He’s in love with his best friends. 

It sucks.)

The two of them include him in a lot of things but they’re also sharing a lot of time without him. He can’t exactly insist on hanging out with them all the time; they’re dating, they don’t want a third wheel on their dates. But he misses them when they’re not around. 

He keeps busy, though. Classes are hard, the house appliances are in need of constant repair, and the hockey season is proving tougher than even he had ever imagined.

They play well. They play really well. Chowder is on fire. Ransom and Holster destroy anything that stands in their way. And Jack and Bitty are a well-oiled machine. They make it all the way to the Frozen Four. 

And they lose.

They had made it all this way just to lose at the last game. He’s let Jack down. All of the seniors, really. And he’s let Chowder and Nursey down. He should have been better. 

He’s shaking he’s so upset. He doesn’t know if he wants to cry or scream or run. 

He does none of them. He showers. He packs up his bag. He goes back to the hotel, to his and Nursey’s room, and flops onto his bed, completely drained. 

He expects Nursey to stay with Chowder. He has some sort of magic goalie privileges and gets a single room on roadies, and who else would you want to be with after a loss like that besides your boyfriend. 

So when the door opens and not only Nursey but also Chowder are standing behind it, Will just blinks at them in disbelief. 

“We were trying to get your attention,” Chowder starts.

“What?” Will asks, still confused.

“You just ran out of there,” Nursey adds. 

“I figured you two would…” Will waves a hand at them. 

Chowder’s face falls from confusion into pity. 

“Dex we wouldn’t leave you alone!” he exclaims, launching himself into Will’s chest. 

Nursey looks like he might cry. Will shoots him his own a watery smile over Chowder’s shoulder and he joins in the frog hug. They all stand like that for a long moment. 

When they finally separate, neither of them says anything about Will wiping tears from his cheeks. 

“Let’s go to C’s room,” Nursey sniffs. “He’s got a king bed, we’ll all fit.”

“You guys want me to stay with you?”

“Of course!” Chowder answers. “It’s Frog Cuddle Night. I’m declaring it. We all need a good cuddle.”

Will ends up the middle spoon and he’s never been happier and more heartbroken all at the same time. 

Heartbroken from losing the game, from letting down his team and the friends he’s come to see as family. 

Heartbroken from being so close and yet so far from what he wants, both in hockey and in that king bed. 

~

Summer comes and goes. He works hard and saves every penny. He Skypes with Nursey and Chowder and once both of them together when Chowder went to New York. 

Before he knows it, he’s back at Samwell. He’s back  _ home _ . 

Chowder moves into the Haus and his room explodes in shades of teal, just like his dorm room had. 

Will spends a lot of time there. He knows they’re best friends and have a class together, but he still feels bad for taking up so much of Chowder’s time when he has a boyfriend and a girlfriend he would probably rather be hanging out with. 

He’s making his excuses about having to go work on some other project one evening when Chowder stops him with a hand on his arm. 

“Let’s go get dinner first. Just the two of us.”

“Like at the dining hall?”

Chowder laughs and Will smiles despite himself. 

(Will would do just about anything to hear Chowder laugh. He’s incredibly glad he laughs so easily.)

“No, not the dining hall. Let me take you out to eat somewhere.”

“C, I’d love to but I don’t have any eating out money this week,” Will explains, his cheeks heating like they always do when money comes up. 

“My treat,” Chowder insists. 

So they go. 

The dinner is wonderful. Chowder has always been easy to talk to, even if they’re rarely alone like this, and conversation flows smoothly between them. Will finds himself blushing a couple of times at a sweet sentiment Chowder lets slip, and soon they’re walking back to campus. 

“Thanks for dinner,” Will says into the quiet between them. 

“Thanks for coming out with me,” Chowder says. 

Will smiles at him. “Anytime.”

~

The next day, Nursey asks about dinner. He’s weird about it in a way that reads “uncomfortable” to Will but he can’t figure out why. 

“It was good, we went to this sushi place, best spicy tuna rolls you’ve ever had, I swear.”

“Yeah, but how was  _ dinner _ ,” Nursey asks again. 

“Good?” Will says, a question in his voice. What the hell was that supposed to mean? He’s already answered the question.

“Oh,” Nursey says, his eyebrows dropping from his hairline. “Forget I asked.”

Will tries to, he really does. But he can’t get it out of his head. 

So he asks Chowder. 

“Hey, Chowder?”

He hums in response and finishes typing something before looking over his laptop to meet Will’s eye. 

“Do you know why Nursey was weird about us having dinner last night?”

“He was weird?”

Will nods. “He kept asking how it was and doing this weird thing with his eyebrows.”

“He was just trying to get deets,” Chowder sighs. “I told him there weren’t any but he didn’t believe me. He hardly believed me that you were even gay at first, I had to convince him that your ‘weird jokes’ were actually awkward coming outs. Think he finally got it now though. Sorry, I’m rambling,” he finishes with a grin.

But Will is hardly listening. 

“Deets?” He feels his cheeks flush. “Why would there be deets from our dinner?”

Chowder looks at him for a long moment. 

“Dex,” he begins. “Did you not realize when I asked you to dinner last night that I meant it to be a date?”

Forget his cheeks being flushed, his entire body is one giant blush now. His ears burn and he feels entirely too warm.

“What?” he finally manages. 

Chowder smiles at him and set his laptop aside. “I should have been more clear, I’m sorry.”

“That’s okay,” Will croaks.

“Did you have a good time?”

“Yes,” he breathes. “I always like spending time with you.”

“Do you want to date, then? It’s totally okay if you don’t want to. I know non-monogamy isn’t for everyone and--”

“What about Nursey?”

Chowder blinks. “What about him?”

Will is certain he is going to combust from embarrassment. 

“Nursey doesn’t have any say in who I date,” Chowder continues. “But if you’re worried about your friendship with him, we can all talk.”

“It’s not that,” Will tries again, but the words stick in his throat and he settles for shaking his head vigorously. 

“Do you like Nursey?” Chowder asks quietly. 

“I like you, too!” Will insists, pushing down the panic threatening at confessing his crush. His crush _ es. _

Chowder smiles again, bright like the sun. “Well, that’s alright then. Let’s talk to Nursey.”

Chowder texts Nursey and soon his graceless entrance to the Haus is announced by way of a stubbed toe and a curse. Chowder shakes his head and gets up to go meet his boyfriend. 

What is Will doing? He couldn’t date both of them! Could he?

Despite their polya relationship, Will has never considered dating both of them somehow. He’s just always assumed he’s the odd one out, the least handsome frog, the third wheel. Nothing else had ever crossed his mind. 

A few minutes later, Nursey and Chowder finally come back to C’s room. 

Nursey looks much less like he’s about to run away from the conversation than he had earlier. 

“Hey,” Nursey greets. 

Will stands, suddenly nervous. 

“Hi,” he replies. 

“So,” Chowder cuts in. “Do you want to tell Nursey what you told me?”

He’s grinning like this is the best thing to ever happen to him. 

“I didn’t know last night was a date.”

Chowder laughs. “Not that part.”

“I was getting there,” Will groans. “Look, I didn’t know last night was a date because I spend most of my time around you two trying not to let slip how much I like both of you. Because polya or not, I didn’t think I had a chance.”

Nursey grins. “I like you, too, Dex.”

“I think it goes without saying, but since I clearly flubbed that up last night, so do I.”

Will nods. “I get that, now.”

“So, what do you think? Wanna be our boyfriend?” Nursey asks.

“How,” Will swallows hard. “How does it work?” 

Chowder and Nursey look at each other. 

“I think it’d probably work a lot like now,” Chowder starts. 

“Yeah, sometimes all three of us go out, sometimes just a pair of us, and we’re all still best friends. Only now we get to make out and hold hands.”

Will looks between the two of them, still unsure.

“I need to think about this,” Will says after a moment, his two best friends looking at him expectantly is suddenly too much for him.

“Of course,” Chowder says.

“Take all the time you need,” Nursey says. 

“It’s not anything I’ve thought about, is all,” Will continues. “And you’re my best friends. I don’t want to mess that up.”

“Will,” Nursey interrupts his rambling, and the first name jars him. “It’s really okay, take all the time you need.”

Will smiles at him.

“Do you want a hug?” Chowder asks. 

Will nods, second nature to being asked if he wants a frog hug, and he’s quickly engulfed. And it feels... right. 

They’re all constantly cuddling and going out together. He already gets confused as both of their boyfriends on a regular basis. And Will would be lying if he hadn’t thought about dating one or the other of them. When they had started dating each other, he’d thought he’d missed his chance. But he could have both. 

They  _ wanted  _ him to have both. 

“Y’know what?” he says, still hugging both of them. “Let’s do it. Let’s all be boyfriends.”

“Yeah?” Nursey asks.

“Yeah. It feels right,” Will smiles.

Chowder grins and kisses his cheek. Nursey follows suit on the other side. 

“Boyfriends,” Chowder agrees.

~

In the end, it’s nothing like what they had been before, even if it’s exactly like it had been before. 

Will regularly wakes up to cute texts from one or both of his boyfriends. He walks hand in hand to class with Chris and to practice with Derek. Frog cuddles turn into frog make outs and entire afternoons are lost to them. 

Initially, Will had been worried that he would feel like the odd one out, still. The latecomer. But Chris and Derek had folded him into their little traditions and had quickly created new ones with him. He wasn’t playing catch up, he was building a relationship. It was exhilarating. 

They still have frog movie night and chirp each other at practice and team breakfast, but the feeling of belonging is so sure, so right, that Will isn’t sure how he ever functioned without both of them by his side.

Every time he tries to tell them this, though, he gets completely choked up and ends up giving up.

For their six month anniversary as a triad, he decides he’s going to finally find the words. And write them down. Because if he tries to say them out loud he will cry. 

The cards are filled with long, run-on sentences that Will is afraid will make no sense outside of his own mind, but he is committing to it. He seals each into their envelope and goes to meet his boyfriends for their date. 

Seated in a little circular booth, one of them on either side, he hands them their cards. By the second sentence, Chris is crying. By the middle of the card, so is Derek. 

Chris tackles him straight into Derek, who gladly accepts the armful of boyfriends and hides his face in Will’s hair. 

“I love you both so much,” Will says quietly. “Even if I’m not always great at saying it.”

“I love you, too, Will,” Derek sniffs. 

“I love you so much!” Chris cries. Will kisses his hair and eases him back up into his seat, taking his weight off of Derek. 

“Happy anniversary,” he grins at his boyfriends. 

Samwell is truly everything Will wanted is to be.


End file.
